NATION NETWORK

THE FLAMES FIFTEEN RETURNS

April 29, 2014, 5:18 PM |

Welcome back to the Flames Fifteen – this is our 3rd annual ranking of the Flames’ prospects.

THE METHODOLOGY

It is thought that a player’s 23 year old season is the one where he goes from prospect to NHLer – or, for some, to tweener. Therefore, that is our cut-off line. I asked the evaluators to base their rankings on four things – performance, NHL readiness, age and impact of their position. The weight each judge put into each category was up to them.

We asked our panel to rank every player under 23 in the Flames system as of March 30th (when I sent out the request), with points being awarded to the top 15 – 1 point for their 15th ranked player, and 15 for their 1st ranked player, etc. In the event of ties, the highest overall single ranking prevailed. The panel this year includes myself, Kent Wilson, Ryan Pike, Book of Loob, Christian Roatis, Byron Bader and Taylor McKee.

SEE YA

There are numerous faces who didn’t make the cut, graduated or left the rankings.

Not Top-15, but received Top-15 votes:

Pat Sieloff (16th) – one 15th place vote, one 10th place vote.

Mike Ferland (17th) – two 15th place votes, one 14th place vote, one 13th place vote.

Coda Gordon (18th) – one 15th place vote, one 14th place vote.

Graduated:

TJ Brodie (1st last year)

Mark Cundari (7th last year)

Lance Bouma (8th last year)

Ranked last year but not this year:

Roman Horak (4th, traded)

Laurent Brossoit (10th, traded)

Mike Ferland (14th, injured)

We’ll have our profile on the 15th ranked prospect up on Thursday. Until then, formulate your own top-15 and play along over the next few weeks.

If we are evaluating potential by the time each prospect is 23 yrs old, then I like your list with Poirier at 4, Gillies at 6 and Klimchuk at 8. I would question whether Jankowski could be higher but he is still so far away that he’s an unknown.

And yes two things inevitably pop up…Poirier is the only RW (as a left-handed shooter) and few D prospects. No doubt this will be one of Mr Treliving’s first order of business as he continues the process of re-shaping the team.

Moneyhands is more established thank JH, but JH has a higher ceiling. Depends on the transition, but I can see Johnny Hockey living up to his name in the NHL. Poirier, Granlund and Sven are all skilled guys, so I think they could be fairly equal in point production in the NHL. Arnold is the wildcard here. He is fairly big and could transition fairly quickly.
The other guys will see setady improvement, but they are depth guys mostly. Ferland could still become a Lucic type, and Janko could become a #1C.

Not an especially strong list. Would be great to see if a turnaround in quality similar to what we have seen with the forwards could be effected within the next 2 years, with up to 3-4 Top 3 D prospects being developed in the system.

I too put more emphasis on big picture rather than raw potential but I will keep Monahan on the list for two major reasons; one age (23) was the age mentioned and he still has a fair amount of growth in his body and strentgh to do before he has arrived and secondly because I do fear the sopohmore jinx. Granlund is next as he had the best AHL season before his call up, prior to being injured he looked NHL ready and he has probably been their best forward since he went back down, After that I would go Gaudreau, Sven, Ortio, Wotherspoon, Knight, Rhino as all ready to push for spots on the team during the upcoming season, then Poirier, Arnold, Klimchuk, Agostino, Kulak, Gilles, Jankowski and Kanzig.

Of the top 10 teams with the best prospect pools there are several who have D and RW prospects that could be of interest for the Flames.

They are BUF, DAL, NYI, ANA, CLB and DET. FLA has RW but no D. A trade with these teams, whether to move up in the 2014 Draft and/or to add depth prospects, could be good trading partners based on what they have stockpiled.

Also of interest..PHX appears to have less depth across most positions of interest to the the Flames so trading prospect likely won’t be happening in the near future.

BUF- Armia, DAL- Chaisson, NYI- Colberg?, I think Gudbranson could be had for a bargain, especially if they pick Ekblad. A change of scenery could do him well. What would it take to get any of these guys? I would still give up a lot to get Coyle in a Flames jersey.